


A Beast Is in the Heart

by Asuka Kureru (Askerian)



Series: psychic wolves for every fandom yee [10]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Shinigami, Dubious Consent, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Psychic Wolves, Telepathic Sex, Wolves Made Them Do It
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-02-13
Packaged: 2019-10-03 16:36:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17287622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Askerian/pseuds/Asuka%20Kureru
Summary: "Jaegerjaquez, where are you?"Yawning into the phone, Grimmjow looked around himself pointedly, though there would be no way for Tousen to know it. The guy seemed to divine disrespect no matter what shape it came in; it worked for Grimmjow. Offense that still came with plausible deniability. Good enough."No idea. Why don't you ask Suzy?""You know full well you and Pantera are out ofSuzumushi'srange. Return to base, now."Grimmjow looked at the side of the road, where a short-furred, long-bodied, entirely black dire wolf was nosing under some flowers for field mice. Here, outside of the military base and away from the Espada pack, Pantera almost managed to forget her coming heat.Had they stayed at the base she would have savaged Szayel's stupid hump-machine of a dog-wolf already, but nobody seemed to want to hear that.--Fusion with the Iskryne/A Companion to Wolves series by Elizabeth Bear and Sarah Monette.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I cannot pass through a fandom without writing at least one psychic wolves or daemon AU. It's a physical impossibility. I'd say I'm sorry but I'm really not. animal freeeends~
> 
> Anyway! Rules are easy.  
> 1\. A human creates a mental bond with a wolf for various reasons. (Nothing stops a man from bonding to a bitch wolf or a woman from bonding a male.) When a female wolf goes into heat WHOOPS so does her human.  
> 2\. Wolves think more in scents and notions than in sounds and full sentences but they can learn. They're not human-smart but still hella smart.  
> 3\. In the original books which were about Viking-era people the wolf-brothers were normal human but there were still cave trolls and dwarves/elves around, if on the way to extinction already. 
> 
> Also a massive heads up in that there is already inherent dubcon in "gotta fuck" situations, and while Ichigo tries to navigate that as respectfully as he can, a lot of Grimmjow's usual entourage are completely uninterested in attempting to make it any better; a few actively make it worse. Grimmjow sounds fairly flippant about it but there's still clear noncon being mentioned in his backstory.

" _Jaegerjaquez, where are you?_ "

Yawning into the phone, Grimmjow looked around himself pointedly, though there would be no way for Tousen to know it. The guy seemed to divine disrespect no matter what shape it came in; it worked for Grimmjow. Offense that still came with plausible deniability. Good enough.

"No idea. Why don't you ask Suzy?"

" _You know full well you and Pantera are out of Suzu **mushi** 's range. Return to base, now._"

Grimmjow looked at the side of the road, where a short-furred, long-bodied, entirely black dire wolf was nosing under some flowers for field mice. Here, outside of the military base and away from the Espada pack, Pantera almost managed to forget her coming heat.

Had they stayed at the base she would have savaged Szayel's stupid hump-machine of a dog-wolf already, but nobody seemed to want to hear that. _'You're in control of your wolf, Jaegerjaquez, not the other way around!',_ yeah fucking right. What nobody seemed to get among the higher-ups was that: one, dire wolves were damn well sentient enough to know who they wanted to fuck and who they wanted to murder without the support and guidance of their benevolent human masters and two, Grimmjow sure as hell had no interest in being fucked by Szayel either. Guy was a straight-up freak.

(Like. Seriously. He'd named his wolf _Fornicaras_. Grimmjow rested his fucking case.)

Also Grimmjow did not like how eager he was to test how much he could get away with while a man and his sister-wolf were starved half out of their shared mind for a good dicking.

But Aizen did not believe in restricting attendance to a breeding. Not when they were trying to stabilize the bloodlines.

Fucking Halibel getting her fucking Tiburon mauled three days before Pantera's heat. Grimmjow could have dealt with getting plowed by Llargo and Cifer if he had her to look forward to... Probably. Okay, maybe not Yammy Llargo either. Eugh.

Anyway he'd been pissing off the higher ups enough that they may not have allowed him to stop at three, either way. For all he knew they'd have gotten the Numeros in on it too. Oh and fucking Pack-master Starrk bonding himself a bitch cub _now,_ while he was at it; Grimmjow had fucked Starrk before, he was _fine_. The freak had had every single unattached wilding in the pack to work with; why he'd needed to lock himself up in a single partnership --

" _ **Sergeant** , I gave you an **order**._"

"Yeah, yeah, sir, but see -- I still don't know where we are."

The road snaked its way along the side of a hill, or a small mountain; there was probably a town somewhere nearby, but in all likelihood the closest would be on the other side. There were dense green woods everywhere. Not a single house.

Tousen sounded like he was gritting his teeth. Since he was doing it at least two hours out from where Grimmjow was, Grimmjow allowed himself to smirk about it. " _Just find a marker you can read._ "

"Yeeeah, that's the issue, I'm fu-- really shit at Japanese. And they don't bother with English signs out in the boonies."

" _... Retrace the path you took._ "

"Tried to. Then got lost."

A moment of silence, heavy with threats and disbelief. " _You're a **wilderness specialist**_."

"Back-country Japan ain't much like the Sahel _or_ the Amazonian forest." Grimmjow gave a considering pause. "Sir."

" _And I suppose that's why our best trackers can't follow you either_."

Nah, that'd be the series of lumber trucks they'd hitched a ride on. Had been fun jumping from one to the next without stepping onto any ground. "Not a clue, sir. Asphalt. How does it work."

What was really good about working cover ops was, they couldn't order him to turn on his personal phone geolocation. The thing had been disabled with prejudice before even being issued to him, and Grimmjow had zero idea how to fix that.

" _Sergeant, your sister's current irrationality is a very thin excuse right now._ "

Pantera lifted her muzzle to him, snorted. Her intensely green eyes scanned his face, then flicked in something that was clearly an eye roll. It was the best piece of human body language he'd ever taught her to emulate, in his opinion. 'Shake hands!' was for crotch lickers.

... Fuck.

"Pantera I swear to God if you start licking yourself I'm gonna kick you down the hill."

 _It's a good idea though_ , she replied carelessly. _It itches._

"It won't _help_ , you dumb bitch, you _know_ that." Argh. "My bad, Captain, she's getting twitchy. I'm gonna make her run around a bit. Call you back in twenty."

" _ **Jaegerja--**_ "

Whoops. Turned off. How'd that happen. Mysteries of modern technology.

"Okay, time to find you a deer." He tapped into her senses; the forest bloomed with damp greenery and strange mushrooms, acrid mammal piss, bird feathers. "Do they even have deer around here?"

 _They have the boring ones_ , Pantera shared, flicking him a memory of scentless images on a screen -- small tame deer that throngs of people admired and hand-fed, only feral in the way that city pigeons were.

"Yeah, I got no idea how to find _that_ place." Some kind of temple; so if he remembered Aizen's blathering about his native country well, it would be on historical wolf pack lands anyway.

Seemed so weird to him to maintain packs and just... live with them, instead of using them the way they were meant to be used. Seemed almost more normal to have city cops with wolves, or even firefighters, where the animals could do _something_ , even if it wasn't warfare.

Civilian wolves. What the shit. Oxy _moron_ indeed.

Then again boring pedestrian dire wolves were probably less well suited to warfare than Arrancar. Even the American Marines breed was kind of plodding compared to them, and of course they had no defenses against--

"Pantera, what did I fucking _tell you_ about licking yourself."

He planted a foot on her rump and shoved her down the slope; she bounded away into the underbrush with careless ease, disappeared in the bushes. He had three seconds to rush to the other side of the road and throw himself at a tree, haul his legs up by sheer strength of biceps before she pounced across the whole road in a single bound. Her bear trap maw snapped closed on air and not his booted heel, but barely.

He swung a leg down to tempt her to jump for him again, then when she was in the air he dropped right on top of her, shoving a forearm across the bottom of her jaw to keep it from closing. They crash-landed in a bush and rolled downslope back onto the road, bouncing painfully across rocks and other woodsy shit on the way.

"Ow, ow, okay, I ain't got any bracers on right now, stop it." She couldn't crunch down hard enough to take his arm off like this but her back molars were still pointy and his flesh would give up way before his bones did.

 _I win!_ she crowed, letting go of his forearm to dance around him, tail wagging. _Mmm tasty_. _Rend/devour when you die/gnaw on your bones!_

Grimmjow wiped a trail of blood off his elbow, rolled his eyes as she licked over his fingers to catch the last of it. Now his one civilian outfit was covered in brambles and dirt. Should have gone out in fatigues...

...Nah.

 _Car!_ she warned him, ears flicking downslope, and the both of them ghosted back up through the tree line. Grimmjow's white outfit was gonna be a pain for stealth purposes but if they got far enough the leaves would be dense enough to block him out. He directed Pantera to keep going uphill and away from the road.

He had a map of the country in his head -- lost, hah, as if -- and there was a middling town on the other side of the mountain, nestled in a deep valley. The closest wolf sanctuary was miles away -- which was good because those suckers got territorial when allowed to stay in one area for too long and in her current state Pantera would want to fuck first and murder second, which would be the opposite of the locals.

Japan was curiously stiff about its wolves working for their dinner; as a major international travel destination Tokyo would have had police wolves to fuck -- smaller packs, less rabid about their borders -- but he doubted Karakura was big enough.

Also, yeah, the thing where psychic contact with any Arrancar wolf may render a basic one insane. Eh.

They could probably hunker down in the woods and have Grimmjow go into town for supplies in strategic strikes until she was over it. Abstinence during a heat was a total bitch, but still better than Szayel and Yammy.

\--

"--And then Karin tripped him, and he landed in the puddle! On his face!"

Ichigo pinched his lips not to respond more openly to Yuzu's story. His little sister visibly thought her twin had dreadfully overreacted. Making someone fall into a puddle in public... Yeah, if he'd been there while some hormonal little jerk tried to feel up the most defenseless of his two baby sisters he may have used his fist.

Not very hard, but his fist.

 _Overreaching cub must be taught his place_ , Zangetsu agreed from Yuzu's other side. _Rudeness shall be bitten out._

It was always pretty hilarious what kind of words Zangetsu's images and ideas turned into in Ichigo's head. Probably his previous human partner had been the fancy sort. Like Rukia and Shirayuki, they imaged/worded/felt things all distant and proper, too. Maybe it was a Court of Pure Beasts thing.

"Big brother!" Yuzu protested at his silence.

"Yeah, yeah, she maybe overreacted a _little_ bit. But the dude was trying to _cop a feel_ , Yuzu. I don't care about his excuse. A guy like that, you gotta teach early to put his hands away, or he'll just get bolder."

Yuzu sighed, then frowned deeply in what he knew was her Ichigo Mimic face, and deepened her voice. "Cool motive, still groper!"

Snorting, Ichigo shifted the plastic bags he was carrying to his other hand and ruffled her hair. "Ayep."

"But still, he's nice when he's not with his friends and they don't give him dumb challenges..."

"Zangetsu says in that case he'll just have to eat his friends."

Yuzu goggled at him for a second and then punched him in the arm. "Liar! He didn't!" She turned to Ichigo's massive male wolf, ribs-high on her with the lion-mane thickness of his black ruff. The white trailing from his chin to his chest and staining the tips of all his toes made a perfect tuxedo, apart from the places where the black had started to grey with age. "You didn't, right?"

Karin could hear Ichigo's wolves, sometimes, when they pushed. Yuzu was so wolf-deaf Shiro could be screeching on top of her for an hour straight and she wouldn't notice. Zangetsu was really good with spoken words, though, and with taking context cues from Ichigo's mind; he shook his head slowly from side to side, regally.

Yuzu punched Ichigo's arm again. "Big brother! You --"

Her sudden silence made him frown, look around for a pack of young idiots, or one of the gangsters who sometimes thought it smart to bother him. But there wasn't really... Oh. ... Wow.

"That foreigner is _really_ pretty," Yuzu whispered, cheeks flushing. "Do you think he's a movie star? He looks like a movie star, doesn't he?"

Ichigo cleared his throat, pulled his eyes away. _Blue_ hair. Sky blue, or even lighter, brighter than that. Clothes that said 'yeah, I know I'm hot' and a body that really didn't contradict it. Face--

"Not all foreigners can be movie stars, Yuzu," he muttered, determined not to stare. Though there was something...

The man was looking at them. No -- at Zangetsu. Fair enough. Wolves were rare outside of the ancestral mountains and while the locals had slowly gotten used to Ichigo's beasts and all his occasional visitors in the last three years an out-of-towner would have no reason to expect them.

Zangetsu looking back in grave interest, though, that was more unexpected.

 _Something weird?_ he asked, prodding gently at their connection.

Zangetsu was as cryptic as ever, though. _You'll find out_ was all he said before he turned away, and then they passed each other and the chance to look was lost.

Mostly lost. Ichigo threw a quick look over his shoulder -- Yuzu did the same, guiltily...

Eye contact like a gut punch.

The faintest tendril on the breeze of...

_Interest. Fight/shred/kill, or --?_

The foreigner curled him a long, lopsided smirk, eyelids smug and heavy, and turned to walk away.

Ichigo only figured out he was staring when Yuzu elbowed him under the ribs and whispered, "Are you looking at his _pants_?"

"...Oh my god. Oh my god, _no_. Yuzu, no! Why would you think -- aagh!"

He had _not_ noticed the pants. The weird moment of creepy psychic contact had been a lot more important. Had it really come from the guy? Was he a wolf-brother too, or descended from oni like Chad or some other kind of weirdness like Inoue? Was he like _Ishida?_ Why would he even _think_ about fighting Ichigo and his wolf?! Was this another Court of Pure Beasts complication, and would those _ever end_??

(He had totally noticed the pants. And the filling thereof.)

But seriously, what the fuck. Brooding, he kept walking, a handful of plastic bags to each hand.

"... Hey, how would you know the pants were worth looking at unless you were looking too," he finally thought to ask his innocent fifteen-year-old baby sister.

Yuzu giggled nervously and took off at a gallop. Yelling, Ichigo gave chase, his wolf trotting leisurely after him.


	2. Chapter 2

Sleeping bag, kleenex, sports drinks galore, and even more lube than sports drinks. He'd made a little lean-to with branches against a rock in some corner of woods Pantera assured him were never visited, gotten _comfortable_ in it, pants zipper and all, and now he was looking at his dumbass partner as she backed up against tree trunks and growled a lot. Lack of hands was a bitch, huh.

Lucky for him, Grimmjow did have hands. Not so lucky, he wasn't actually the one who needed to come. Even if it really, _really_ felt like it.

"You look really stupid."

She paced around the lean-to, hackles raised. _(Frustrated-bite!) You'll look very dead soon._ He snorted, said nothing when a squirrel made the mistake of moving around several meters up and she threw herself up that trunk hard enough to shake the squirrel off its branch and snatch it in mid-fall. She didn't even swallow it, just crunched it apart and shook the pieces out all over the place in tiny chunks of gore.

They were well past the point where he usually got into a fistfight with the human partners of Pantera's hopeful studs.

(He fucking hated it that she had to be restrained. She wasn't allowed to fight her studs anymore, because they were all whimpering _pussies_ , so he did it for her. Aizen was running out of patience about that too. He knew next stop would be bondage city for them both.)

That big male in town had looked pretty solid, too bad Grimmjow couldn't be sure if he was bound to the boy or the kid. (The boy looked just about old enough for a fuck but the girl looked like she'd barely even started puberty. If Grimmjow went into a heat frenzy around her, shit was going to happen that he apparently still had morals enough to regret.) Too bad Pantera would fuck up the wolf without even trying, just from saying hello, never mind from the fighting afterwards... There was no way a wolf bred for show-worthy fur would survive a single pass with a Covert Ops beast.

_... Pretty fur?_

_Mmm._ He closed his eyes, visualizing. _Handsome beast. Cubs would be real hairy though._ And if it was the boy... Sportsy type, Grimmjow could tell, wiry and tough for a civilian -- might still be a virgin though, probably not very into guys the rest of the year, but a heat took care of that. Would he hesitate to get a good grip on Grimmjow's hips and put the strength of his back into --

 _Find_ , Pantera said, and disappeared through the trees. Eyes flying open, Grimmjow jumped onto his feet, hissed as his open fly dug into the underside of his erection.

"No, _hey_ \-- you dumb fucking bitch, no!"

He started at a painful jog after her, sped up the second he had managed to constrain himself in his pants and zip back up. She wasn't trying to lock him out of her mind so he knew exactly where she passed through, but she was on four real fast legs and didn't feel like waiting. Maybe if -- hey, a cliff. He threw himself heels first down the slope, hands catching and releasing at exposed roots and bushes, starting a little landslide under his feet. There, that should cut five minutes off him getting to the town -- but she knew the area he'd been in, had lifted it off his mind, and now she just had to find the scent.

Road. First houses. It was dark and empty outside, after dinner and edging toward the end of the first movie of the night, but people were gonna see him, he was a Westerner with blue hair, white clothes and a hard-on. He didn't slow down. Fucking Pantera, fucking --

\--Oh. Wolf scents. One male and _two_ males and -- older female scent, growl, upper lip curled back, fainter ones, visitors -- so many visitors, fresh and frequent but not _here_ now -- the acrid scent of piss markings, here, this is mine --

He could tell where she was, that in tracking the tuxedo male she was turning back toward him, and he had a sense of how the streets were built, parallel-ish lines and cutting backstreets between the blocks. He burst out of the last of the slopey streets and reached the flat ones at the bottom of the valley and could feel her zagging, bright with excitement and fury.

She'd been trained better than to howl to announce her presence. She did it anyway.

It was like getting punched in the guts from the inside; a heavy thud of desire and maddening emptiness. He didn't stumble but he did slow down, dizzy from her reaction to catching the scent. If the dog-wolf's human was the little girl, how was Grimmjow gonna get her out of this clusterfuck? He couldn't think it out, dizzy with rising need. Even if she had smart parents and good locks this wasn't a high security area; he might end up breaking a door down to get to her once Pantera's heat frenzy pulled him under. Who the _fuck_ allowed their kids to bond so young, anyway?

(He'd been thirteen when he got Pantera but he hadn't been thirteen like this kid seemed to be thirteen, sheltered suburban brat with no worries -- and Pantera had been a _cub_ , not a raring-to-go adult...)

Flicker of movement in the corner of his eye -- pale in the evening shadows -- big, _fast_ \--

Grimmjow threw himself into a roll without pausing to assess the threat. He came out into a crouch and dodged to the side, behind the dubious shelter of a parked car, his hand flying to the gun he didn't carry out of base, the knife he'd put away because who wanted to jerk off with a knife sheath digging into your back, fuck, fuck, _fuck._

Something had landed in the middle of the street, right where Grimmjow should have been standing, braked with all four feet. Another wolf. This town wasn't fucking _supposed_ to have wolves.

It looked back at him and then Grimmjow was ass on the ground trying not to throw up. Head ringing with blooming pain -- senses buzzing, crackling with junk-ass data, fragments of old yells and the uncomprehending terror of a child watching an adult hand rise.

He broke the beer bottle under his hand and swung, slashing through ivory fur. Knowing down to his bones that Aizen had found him -- that Kyouka Suigetsu was gonna leave him braindead this time and it _hurt_ , he was half-blind with it, choked with terror and despair and he was gonna _maim that bastard if that was the last thing he did on Earth_.

(It was going to be the last. He knew it was going to be.)

Something rammed into his side -- they rolled -- Kyouka Suigetsu wasn't _white_ \-- _two_ enemies two wolves _Pantera, help!_

It was nothing but muscle memory after that, a brutal elbow hit and a twist of the arm in his hand -- bending his leg aside so the vicious heel strike glanced off his kneecap instead of shattering it, slapping away a punch inches before it crushed his throat. 

He still had the bottle in hand. He flipped his grip on it, broken ends downward -- he was gonna _die_ , be devoured and die ( _who **cared,** fuck off_), he was -- gonna -- _murder them **first** _\--

" _Yamero, Shiro!_ "

Buzzing quiet, dizziness.

An alley between houses. A car at his left. A guy bleeding from a split lip in front of him, fists raised, eyes blazing.

A rangy, red-eyed, pink-nosed wolf with lips curled back to unveil flushed gums and ivory teeth, red blood smeared in the pale fur of his chest. (Grimmjow had missed the throat, but not by much. Huh.)

Not Kyouka Suigetsu. Not any of the Arrancar.

 _Kill_ , the albino wolf radiated, a desire so strong Grimmjow almost took a thoughtless step forward to stab the guy in the underside of his jaw.

" _Iie!_ " A rapid spate of Japanese, more to the wolf than toward Grimmjow, and then a long frowning look at his stance, at the bottle.

The kid was the one who stepped backwards first, who made a show of lowering his fists. Not entirely, but some. "Suman -- ah. Sorry? ... English?"

... English. Right. That was a thing people with some kinds of tongues and lips did. "...I can do English."

He wiped at his face, under his nose -- sweat, not blood. Huh, after the mindfuck he'd just gotten that was a bit of a surprise. Had this little civilian freak really --

\-- That was the boy from earlier, with the tuxedo wolf. So this albino thing would be his, and the other male would be the girl's, but if Grimmjow and Pantera stayed here they'd _both_ \--

"Right!" he said, "I'mma kidnap you for a bit."

Then Pantera turned the corner at a breakneck pace and broadsided the albino wolf in mid-turn, sending him flying across the pavement. Grimmjow had felt her coming and had dodged accordingly; the boy was clipped by his wolf's skull and stumbled, almost fell. Grimmjow grabbed his arm over the elbow, blasting _mind-powerful male!_ down the bond before Pantera could rip the throat of the wolf who had dared to attack her bondmate right out.

"Thank you," the young man stuttered, finding his feet again.

"No problem," Grimmjow replied casually, and leaned forward and threw him across his shoulders. 

"-- _Oi!_ Nanda, teme--"

 _Pantera, keep Whitey off me. Herding/baiting, lead to a trap_. _**No killing.**_

Snarling her frustrated anger, she did, blocking a pass from the other wolf. Grimmjow could feel them clashing mind-wise too even as he started jogging off with his struggling burden. The albino wolf's rage was a swelling tsunami of sharp edges -- murder-lust full of graphic feel-tastes of open flesh and spilled organs, how-dare-you hate. Boy was _fucked up_.

In contrast Grimmjow couldn't even feel the human on his shoulders, drowned out. 

"Hanase yo! Oi -- stop!"

"Can't do that, boyo," Grimmjow said, and snatched up the second wrist with the first. The guy's arms weren't that thin but with a little twist he could pin both of them...

"He will kill your wolf!" the guy shouted, sounding honestly panicked.

Behind them, another snarl, a yip of pain. Fury like a thundercloud.

Pantera dispersed it with a single slash of willpower, straight into the albino beast's wide open, unprotected mind. A deep stab of certainty, the echo of all those other wolves they'd killed, the things they had felt while dying under her fangs. Nothing emotional from _her_ , nothing about _wishing_ to harm, just the clear-edged detailing of real memories. Real deaths.

"Yeah, I don't think he will," Grimmjow said casually in the sudden void of a quiet suburban evening, and tried not to obsess over body warmth and muscle strength and the weight of the guy's body on him, pressing down somewhere more interesting than his shoulders...

... In the darkened backstreet in front of him there was the tuxedo wolf, standing right in the center, blocking the way.

 _You will not take him unwilling,_ it said, transmitting so clear, so empty of echoes-of-meanings and weird subconscious associations it felt like talking out loud with another human, almost _._

Weighed down by a struggling almost-adult male of a civilian, no gear on him, not even solid fatigues to climb shit without it hobbling his movements and tearing, Grimmjow could do nothing but swear.

\--

"Zangetsu!" Ichigo yelled in relief, catching a glimpse of him, and kicked with both feet. His captor (and what the _fuck_ was that about?!) swayed easily under him, moving with Ichigo and not deigning to lose his balance even a little bit. _(Rain on slick glass and pavement) help!_

 _Shh. All shall end well._ Zangetsu was cool calm and watchfulness to balance out Shiro's frenzy, soothing the parts of Ichigo's mind that reeled, fighting not to latch onto the man's neck with teeth and nails, to gouge his eyes out.

_Help (why did they -- why attack) (kill them) (no!) he's so strong (fought hand to hand just one pass so **strong** ) -- they've killed? They've killed wolves before are they gonna kill us is that why what the **shit** \--_

_Calm yourself,_ Zangetsu sent out, pressing a blanket of quiet on his mind, insulating out Shiro's murderous howls. _No deaths._

_But they--_

"Hey, kid," the guy said in his low, rough-edged voice. "You need to get that one to back off right the fuck now."

Ichigo kneed him in the temple, or... thighed him in the temple, which didn't have the same impact, but he was frustrated enough for it. "Why?!" he snarled back in English, and slipped right back into Japanese. "Why the fuck should I, you crazy asshole, put me down!"

His wolf felt just as bad, as fucked-up dangerous as Shiro, only colder and more practiced about it. Just as grating and painful--

_\-- (fuck fuck **fuck** ) (girl near? Gotta run gotta leave before) (so tiny flat-chested scrawny barely coming up to my clavicle I'm gonna break her fuck--)_

\-- Yuzu. Yuzu in the guy's mind, full of dread and an odd wave of sickening -- something. Something heavy in Ichigo's belly, twisted and pulsing with...

"Why is my sister in your head?"

 _ **Sister** oh hell _flashed between them, and then an image like a punch in the nose -- the man between Yuzu's legs. Crying Yuzu, _naked_ \-- blood everywhere.

Ichigo tore his arm free and reared backwards -- fell, was yanked by the ankle before he hit the ground. He kicked up into the guy's armpit, rolled when he let go, mind incandescent with fury. He was up in a flash and tackling the other guy straight into the side of a house, broadsiding him with everything he had. He had the man's collar in one hand and was winding up for a punch when his fist was seized, his ankle pulled --

Headbutting him in the nose was pure spinal reflex, even as he was whirled around to be slammed against the wall in turn. 

_Ichigo, be calm!_ Zangetsu berated, a feeling of nipping a cub. _Feel deeper! **Feel**._

He stopped fighting for a second, panting harshly, the guy pinning him tight with his unfair height and weight advantage and glaring down, teeth bared like he thought he was a wolf too.

The image of Yuzu -- oh god, even more horrible when Ichigo came back to it, _dug_ through the other's mind for it, tears in her eyes and a vacant look and -- 

Revulsion. _(No I don't want that don't make me **don't make me** )_

"Why would you _have_ to?" he asked, forgetting his English entirely, and the guy glared down at him like it had gotten through anyway. His eyes were so intense they looked unreal, the color muted by the weak lamplight but still too pale, too unusual.

A knot of heat in his belly, guts tugged and cramping over nothing, a void needing to be filled, the all-encompassing craving for --

Ichigo flushed all at once. Sneering, the kidnapper still threw him an image-feel -- on hands and knees, someone's arms tight around his waist, pressing against his -- movement, the burn of _\-- oh **god**_.

"Stop! Stop, I get it, I get --"

Bitch wolf. In heat. No males but his own.

_("It's kinda too bad you're never gonna be allowed to put Zangetsu to stud for Shirayuki. I swear on Zabimaru's head no matter how many normal people you fuck wolfless it's still like being a virgin compared to a heat."_

_"What the **fuck** , Renji, you're talking about -- about me with your **girlfriend** , what the fuck?"_

_"...You're so goddamned civilian sometimes. Also you talk like I wouldn't be there! Shirayuki ain't one of those bitches who are fine with their same old studs not fighting it out first, she wants **quality**. Sometimes quality comes in several packages is all."_

_"Too much information!"_

_"Pff. Anyway -- it's moot."_

_"Because Zangetsu doesn't have a pedigree book or because Shiro might sneak in?"_

_"Both, you dumb fuck. But honestly mostly the second. Sorry, Zangetsu, you look straight off a bloodline poster but you're never gonna get laid because nobody on the planet wants the freak you're saddled with to breed.")_

"You don't get the black one out of here I'm gonna have myself a siblings sandwich," the man rasped, a bare inch from his face.

Bricks digging a pattern into his back, breathless with dying anger and shock and the suddenly overwhelming awareness of a body pressed to his, Ichigo binked.

"Um?"

The man nodded harshly toward Zangetsu. "Isn't she like twelve or something, what the fuck--"

"She's _fifte--_ no, yes, you're very right! She's twelve. No fuck for my baby sister." Ichigo managed to crack a lopsided smile somehow. His lip stung. "It's okay. He's also mine."

The guy was afraid of hurting his sister, had kidnapped Ichigo in some kind of desperate bid to have his sister-wolf get bred by a half-blind walking mindfuck in albino furs rather than risk Zangetsu dragging Yuzu into it. Ichigo liked him a bit suddenly, just for that.

"I have two," he repeated. "Not my sister." 

Hands curled around Ichigo's elbows, the guy leaned his upper body back and stared down at him.

"Whitey and the old dude?"

Blood trailed slowly from his nose, was licked off the corner of his lips when it got there. Ichigo stared in vaguely guilty fascination. He'd done that.

"Um--"

"Ichigo!"

His father's voice. Fuck. Scanning the street over the man's shoulder, Ichigo saw Shiro in a mexican standoff with the black she-wolf, barred from getting to Ichigo's assailant. At the corner, coming up at a run, his father's bulk. The man pinning him to the wall tensed.

"My father," Ichigo said, sending a pulse of thought-memory to make sure he was understood. His English was school-good (actually school-excellent, fuck his teachers for being surprised) but what did that mean in real life? For all he knew he had the worst accent in the world. "I'm fine, old goat, back off!"

Isshin came to a stop a few feet behind Shiro, eyes too shrewd for his stupid face. The westerner stared back without taking a single step back or a single finger off Ichigo.

 _Father huh okay_ echoed back to Ichigo, alongside wariness, an ornery refusal to relinquish his claim that reminded Ichigo of Shiro on roadkill. _(Outsider/unarmed/inconsequential) not wolfed though._

_... No._

The guy flicked him a smirk. _No father-son sandwich either then, damn._

Spluttering, Ichigo slapped his shoulder. "You're an asshole."

He breathed out, shuddering a little, knowing he was starting to blush. Shiro didn't seem to have noticed the scent the female wolf put out, or didn't care about it, but Zangetsu... Damn.

 _She won't let you go_ , the man sent with fierce certainty, _so I won't either. Sorry/not sorry._

Ichigo looked up at him. The tight set of his jaw, the uncaring heaviness of his eyelids. The desperate undercurrents of _my wolf my sister/must protect/nothing else matters_ , so thin and quiet under the rage Shiro and the black one saturated the air with that Ichigo might have missed them entirely had Zangetsu not hummed thoughtfully over them.

Guy was an asshole, no doubt. 

As the brother of two male wolves Ichigo would never know that devouring craving firsthand. He could kind of sympathize, though.

"I'm not coming home tonight, dad," he said in English, so the guy would understand, and tried to make his voice firm and casual, nothing to worry about. 

The guy blinked. "--What, really?"

Ichigo shrugged, ears heating up. "Yeah, sure."

His father was too quiet. Ichigo sneaked him a look as he was trying to nudge the guy back, to disentangle a little --

" _My darling son is becoming a man!_ " he yelled suddenly, in perfectly understandable English, and wiped at his face like he was actually sobbing behind there. Groaning in embarrassment, Ichigo shoved Blue Hair off him.

"Oh, _shut_ up, old goat--"

Isshin entirely ignored his return to Japanese as a subtle request for some fucking privacy, walking past confused Shiro with ease as he looked way too closely at Ichigo's soon-to-be heat hookup. The guy didn't step back or anything either, just tilted his head and watched him back in a way that reminded Ichigo of nothing if not an actual wolf. Hell, his sister was doing the same side-eyeing head-tilt, even as she kept baring her fangs at Shiro. 

"But do you have supplies?"

The guy gave a slow, dismissive blink. "Yeah, sure."

"I'm a doctor," Isshin said, back straight and shoulders square. He actually looked kind of impressive, which was doing a number on Ichigo's sanity and on his embarrassment levels. "I _will_ be seeing the five of you when you're done for stitches and emergency STD treatments."

The guy grinned, white and toothy. "Or what? Police?"

"Oh, god damn it, don't get into a dick measuring contest _now_ ," Ichigo groaned without much hope, and shoved the guy.

"No 'or'." Isshin cracked a thin, weirdly cold-eyed smile. "No 'or'. If you don't agree there's a need for stitches then I will make sure to prove you wrong."

Amused offense rang in the pack sense, along with a heated need to _test_ , to show that they didn't bow down to fucking anyone. _Prove it then_ threaded through with _you've got some nerve/show you your place_ , with --

The black wolf made a sound like a whine and a growl had a blender baby, irritated, wanting to throw herself at Shiro again and tear him apart until he either proved a good fuck or died. The guy blinked, swallowed, eyes hazing over for a telling second.

"Uh -- you okay?"

Ichigo touched his arm. The guy blinked at him, then gave Ichigo the kind of slow-blooming smug smirk that seemed to beg for a fist in it. A second later Ichigo was being, once again and what the _fuck_ , hauled across the guy's shoulders.

"Hey! I said I was coming, put me down!"

His only response was belly-deep laughter, slightly unhinged at the edges. The guy threw Ichigo's dad a two-fingered salute and started to jog right up the street like Ichigo weighed nothing at all. Fuck. Those biceps really weren't for show. The rest of it either. 

He knew his dad was watching them go. Ugh. _I'm never gonna live it down_ , he shared through the pack sense starting to build up between them, along with his unimpressed grumpiness. 

"Hey, it's better than him getting weird about you nailing a dude. Or wanting to actually come and keep an eye on things."

" _Uuuugh_."

At their side Zangetsu walked unconcernedly; he could feel Shiro staring totally baffled when the black wolf judged there was enough space between him and her partner and turned her back on him to follow at a brisk trot.

 _But killing you?!_ Shiro threw out, strangely plaintive. Ichigo bit his lip, tried not to share too much of his rueful amusement. He didn't want to offend the poor guy now, he'd be unmanageable.

"Come on, put me down."

"Nah." _Don't want you to escape. (Chasing you with a hard-on, ow.)_

Ichigo was trying not to laugh in response when he caught the tail end of it, unintended and almost fully body sensations rather than words. _(Your weight on me--)_

Oh. 

Flushing all at once, Ichigo curled up tighter around the guy's neck, pressing his heated cheek against his arm as if he could hide the smell of his reaction that way.

"... What is your name?" he mumbled. It was starting to dawn on him in full that in a pretty short time he was going to know this guy _really_ intimately.

They were going up a sloping street now, the bushes lining the edge of town visible past the last cars. The guy didn't slow down as he gave Ichigo a...

It was a _scent_ name, an overflow of humid greenery and a predator hidden in the middle of all that. Ichigo groaned, slapped at the guy with his one free hand. "I'm not screaming 'oh, big cat in a bush' in the throes of passion, asshole!" he said in Japanese, making sure to image good and strong so the meaning would come through, then switched to English. "Give me your _words_ name."

The guy _chortled_. Ichigo didn't think people chortled in real life. "Grimmjow. I ain't giving you my last name, you won't manage it."

"Gu... rimmujoh," Ichigo tried. Alright, a bit complex. Not too bad. "Grimmjow. I'm Kurosaki Ichigo."

He gave his own scent name right back. (Zangetsu had named him. Shiro didn't have the naming sense of an eyes-still-sealed newborn cub.) Plants also, hardier, from a drier climate, and then just a tiny, well-hidden note of...

"... Is that... a strawberry in a thorn bush," the guy said, and then he was laughing so hard he almost dumped Ichigo off his back. 

"It's blackberries!" Ichigo yelled back, kicking with both feet, "and why is this the one Japanese word you know?!"

 _He knows a **lot** of words_, his wolf said, vaguely puzzled at Ichigo's assertion. _It's just funnier to pretend-deaf._

Snickering, the guy patted his ass, and stepped over the ditch that separated them from the dark, damp woods where Ichigo had apparently made the smart and well-considered decision to lose his wolf-heat cherry. 

"How is this my life," he groused, and couldn't help but sigh and laugh both when Shiro echoed him right back with something that may have been transcribed as _'right?! Now I'm not even getting to kill anyone! What the hell.'_


	3. Chapter 3

Carrying his prize home like a victorious caveman had been fucking hilarious until maybe two minutes into the woods. Then Pantera decided she'd waited long enough, and tackled the shit out of the pretty-furred one.

Suddenly Grimmjow didn't give a single solitary crap about teasing the hell out of the kid. He cared that he was burning up and his belt was on too tight and his pants were the stupidest most constricting shit he'd ever thought to prance about in. He cared that Tuxedo had dodged Pantera's first attack by a hair's breadth and countered with a lightning-fast lunge for her ruff; that she was tearing free, startled and angered but impressed also, that she _wanted_ \--

He curled forward, dumped the kid straight onto a pile of old leaves and moss, attacked his own belt with both hands. Managed to push his pants down to his knees before he remembered his fucking boots, oh fucking shit, why boots, why clothes.

"Oi -- let me help." Hands on his, firmly pulling them away. "Take off your shirt so you can sit on it -- ooor you can sit on wet moss, aa, yoku yatta."

Ass now bare, cold, and damp, and being congratulated over his excellent decision-making skills by a sarcastic little bitch, Grimmjow glared up. The kid sighed, crouched between his feet to start unlacing his boots. 

He looked almost professional until he glanced up and caught a full frontal look at Grimmjow's straining dick. Then he snapped a shoelace. Grimmjow snorted, making a show of leaning back onto his hands, of wiggling his foot. 

"Faster, boot slave." 

"Shut up, even little kids are easier to undress than you." 

"Faster or I'll just fish your dick out and ride it like that." He slammed the mental picture in the kid's mind, as graphic as he could make it. Flushing, the kid yanked a boot free and threw it at his chest. Grimmjow batted it away with a growl--

Clawed paws on Pantera's ribs, catching a grip, pulling her backwards. 

He and _blackberries in a thicket_ got in each other's way tearing at Grimmjow's pants. One leg free, his other boot still on and Grimmjow was _done_ , absolutely done. He snatched up the ( _male's_ ) boy's t-shirt and yanked him into his chest, clawing at shoulders and waist -- needed but how to get --

Something hard and hot spearing into him, no, into Pantera, something _not in him_ and the dissonant echo made him scream frustrated rage, hand tightening to the breaking point on a wrist.

The world whirled. Face down in leaves, arm twisted behind his back and the counter was just instinct at this point, trained down into his bones -- 

That got countered too. Stunned stupid, Grimmjow blinked at the forest floor under his nose. His arm was twisted up firm and borderline painful, wrist pressed between his shoulder blades.

"Matte yo!" _stupid asshole give me a second (god so much skin what do I do--)_

Grimmjow backed up against him; his shoulder screamed in protest. "Just fuck me already -- shove it in, _shove_ it, _give me your fucking dick--_ "

A wave of pleasure echoed out from Pantera, met emptiness, zero fucking stimulation. The cunt he didn't have screamed for it, completely fruitless. Another three minutes of this bullshit and he would cry (Yammy liked to make him cry), he was gonna--

A first push, dry and too tentative to get anywhere, just enough pressure to tease and not to open him up even a little bit; he choked on a rageful sob, howled wordlessly with his mind full of claws. Grabbing, dragging, _stop holding back!_

 _But_ , something protested vaguely. He slashed at it in fury. His body didn't match Pantera's and she snarled in turn, whipped her head around to bite at the male on her back. Someone made a sound of protest, offense. How _dare_ they be offended, he was the one who --

 _\--Oh_. Yes. Finally.

 _(hurt? blood?)_ someone worried. _Jaguar stalking through the rainforest_ hooked that mind with every single mental trick he knew, dragged it forcefully closer to his need. Heat inside him, bright living pleasure-pain. He wanted more.

For a long, impossible second, it didn't work at all, boy-and-wolf holding steady, untouched like marble in a storm. Thick and hot inside him, having forced him open and then _stopped there_.

Then --

 _Yes_.

The male pushed into him again, a heavier thrust than he had expected -- and another. Certainty blooming -- _I can do this. I've got you_. Shuddering with relief, Grimmjow sank into Pantera and her into him and they voiced their pleasure to the night.

Then just. Mating. Being fucked stupid and nothing beyond that, no world farther than their own bodies. Hard and fast thrusts, not in perfect synchronization but on the same tempo. They made noise and didn't care and strained to push back into the solid hold on them, pleased when they couldn't, held safe and tight. Teeth into one of their necks and then into one of their shoulders, the bites overlapping, not quite matching. Good enough.

Pleasure rushed through like a dam breaking, flooded every single crack and cell of their bodies. Rising through two and then four minds, an exponential climb.

Explosion. 

Grimmjow/Pantera floated down with languorous sluggishness, contented mental murmurs. It took them maybe five minutes and maybe five hours to remember they were in different bodies, and that only when...

 _No_ , they grumbled. _Can't/not right to pull out yet._

A little burst of amused dismay came from Grimmjow's stud. He still pulled out. Grimmjow growled, muffled in his own forearm, folded before his face.

 _Oh no/fuck still holding on,_ Blackberries-boy (what was his other name again) realized with alarm. He freed Grimmjow's other arm hurriedly, then helped guide it around and down when Grimmjow realized how stiff his shoulder was, radiating apologies.

He was gonna be the coddling type, huh. How strange. Grimmjow couldn't remember the last time he'd had one of those. His gentlest stud was usually Starrk, and they both considered it borderline creepily affectionate to exchange more than a shoulder pat after Starrk was done and it was someone else's turn. Maybe when he'd been a Numero still, Pantera not yet grown enough to realize all the promises of her bloodline...

Right. Yeah. Shawlong. Never mind.

"My dick holder is still real empty," Grimmjow grumbled as he rolled onto his good shoulder to massage the lancing strain out of the other one. Pantera and Tuxedo Wolf were still tied, ass to ass and dick in cunt and looking way too smug about it. It bothered him not to match -- not as unbearably as before but it itched uncomfortably under his skin.

On hands and knees over him, the guy just blinked. "That was not English," he pointed out, a small smile on his face. 

... Portuguese. Ugh. Grimmjow scowled up at the smartass. "Va te faire foutre," he said in French, just because, then switched to Russian for a blistering tirade on his mother sucking trucker cocks behind rest stops for pocket change because damn it but Grimmjow was still empty over here-- 

Guy actually smacked his ass. That paused him for a baffled second. 

"We're still mind to mind," Grimmjow's stud said in a dry deadpan tone. "My mother is dead so if she sucks things it's probably angels for their feathers. If she was in hell the devil would send her back for giving his demons pretty nails and thanking them for their hard work."

Then as Grimmjow was still trying to decide how to reply to that without going from 'just generally rude' to 'deserves ditched in the middle of heat with his pants still around one ankle like a total knob' -- or (the worse one) 'actually _sensitive_ underneath!', the guy curved a hand around his ass cheek and pressed a couple fingers in.

His face was red as fuck and Grimmjow didn't even need to see it to know, Pantera could smell it and it radiated off him in waves; but radiating even stronger was a sort of giddy smugness.

"... We got ourselves a baby Dom here, didn't we," Grimmjow drawled at Pantera over his shoulder, still staring the other guy down and trying not to melt. Not thick enough by far but the warm sense of physical connection, this-is-right coming from his wolf erased much of the aching and stinging from his chafed ass.

"What is... dom?" 

He curled his fingers patiently as he spoke, feeling Grimmjow's inner walls, thumbed at the rim. Grimmjow shivered, he hoped discreetly.

"Never you mind. Keep going." He was starting to really feel the cold dampness of the forest floor. And fuck but he could say goodbye to his classy white outfit. He'd planned to make himself feel better wearing it instead of fatigues all the damn time; it wasn't an outfit to get heat-plowed in. "But the second they separate we're moving to my hideout."

He thought longingly of his lube and his sleeping bag. The guy grinned, bright in the dark. "Okay. I will keep wanting knee pads and being sad though."

" _Ugh_ , don't _remind_ me." Grimmjow rolled onto his back slowly, careful not to dislodge the guy's finger, swinging a bare leg high above his head so he could plant his heels on both sides of him and then roll his hips back to rest up on the guy's lap.

 _Holy fuck this guy has no joints only elastic_ rang through the pack sense, stained with a burst of desire that owed nothing to the heat. Grimmjow didn't even try to stop himself from bursting out laughing.

Yeah, he had kind of really lucked out here, hadn't he. Ballsy and strong, actually pretty skilled at hand-to-hand, and even while fingering his ass because Grimmjow needed filled like a whore in withdrawal he still respected him and was even kind of generally impressed. Szayel would have been trying to put a second fist up there by now. 

Also he was willing to be used as a cushion so that Grimmjow's ass wasn't pressing a month's worth of rainwater out from the moss and up his crack. Always a plus.

\--

Weirdest day ever, and there had been some serious contenders in Ichigo's past.

Alright, maybe second weirdest. Getting hooked by Shiro had been a lot weirder. Of course Ichigo usually associated meeting his toothier half -- um, toothiest third? -- with other words first. Such as 'traumatic' or 'mind-breaking' or 'what the fuck ever _did_ happen in the real world, between the blinding migraine, the emotions kaleidoscope, and getting into a fistfight in his own mind with a telepathic psychopath on four paws, _and somehow winning?'_

In comparison having his fingers up a guy's ass as his own come seeped through them was weird first, awkward second, and (a surprising contender) arousing third. 'Freaky' and 'scary' were distant, oh, sixth and tenth maybe, respectively. The rest of the list was variations on 'embarrassing' and a lone 'a bit gross but like, not _bad_ gross'.

 _Jaguar stalking through the rainforest_ was stupidly beautiful, though. Made it easier for Ichigo not to turn his burning face away from the debauched sprawl of his body, loose and sated in the moonlight, and so sculpted by effort it bypassed all envy Ichigo could have felt and landed straight on the kind of admiration usually reserved for museum statues.

Movie star. Yeah.

He very, very probably wasn't. Accidental wolf bonds happened in all professions, but scars like these? No way.

"Fuck yeah, tell me I'm pretty," the man -- Grimmjow -- said, unrolling a slow smirk. Ichigo blinked up at his face, jarred, and blushed hot. Had he been -- "You don't need to be broadcasting when you've been ogling me with that dumb look for the last five minutes. You done yet or do you want me to turn over for another look at my better side?"

"I think your face is better than your ass," Ichigo blurted out without thinking. "I mean, not that your ass -- I mean. ... It sounds bad in English with the grammar like this, doesn't it. Fuck."

If he wanted to bury his face in the ground and hope to suffocate Ichigo would need to chuck the guy off him entirely first, and he wasn't quite ready for that. It'd be rude, or something. (Also he would stop feeling the way Grimmjow's body shook with utterly unrestrained peals of laughter.)

Also the asshole had probably seen that coming and locked his ankles behind Ichigo's back, so it would be a fight to get himself free.

"... Is this what's called 'laughing your ass off'," Ichigo said, deadpan through his blush when the guy finally calmed down far enough to blink tears of mirth out of his eyes and look up at him. Which predictably set him off again. Unable to hold onto his lack of expression, Ichigo started chuckling along, averting his eyes and biting his lip not to make it worse. "Because. Please don't. It would still be a shame."

"Aw _yeah_ , babe, flatter me more. Good to be appreciated properly," he purr-laughed, looking up at Ichigo through his eyelashes. Ichigo knew he was laughing at him and still wanted to lean in and see if this was a kisses-allowed hookup.

He realized he'd forgotten Shiro when he felt background frustration boil up all at once.

He threw himself back and up, tore free of the man's legs, dumping him on the ground, rushed at the black wolf. He was too late; Shiro pounced, tackled her halfway to the ground, the front of her body bowed low and almost falling onto her side. Shiro bit down onto her shoulder and she snarled back; Zangetsu tried to turn around to get at Shiro. Then with a yell of human pain (Grimmjow) she and Zangetsu were free of each other. 

Zangetsu pounced on Shiro to get him off, put himself in the middle. His thick ruff was up along his back with offense as he stared Ichigo's other wolf down. Shiro stared back, teeth bared more by habit than anything else, something plaintively confused in the middle of all that anger.

The she-wolf didn't care; she flew over Zangetsu's back like a missile, jaws open and mind full of death. Ichigo tackled her in flight, hitting her flank with his shoulder hard; then as she landed beside Shiro and not _on_ him he flung both arms around his first wolf's white throat, shoulder and undefended neck just under his snapping maw.

It was even odds whether Shiro would bite without a thought in his frenzy and tear out half of Ichigo's throat.

 _ **No**_ , he projected, hanging his whole weight off his wolf's neck -- legs in the dirt, getting dragged, stepped on. Knowing he was hindering Shiro and not the female, knowing she might go right through Ichigo, or Shiro would, to defend himself from her attack. _**No**_ , he kept sending, stark and absolute.

Shiro's scent name, the one he'd chosen for himself as an act of sadistic defiance, was the heavy, meaty stench of open entrails -- hot blood and shit, adrenaline and fear. Sometimes when he was pissed at Ichigo he wound Ichigo's own body scent in it as the victim being torn open alive. Ichigo couldn't actually remember that part well enough to add it in; he just threw out the strongest smells and hoped the recognition would calm Shiro down ( _this is you, I know you, I'm with you_ ) instead of winding him up, making him crave the real thing.

"You're fucking insane," the man snarled, up close and standing. 

Ichigo was vaguely aware of him moving to get in the black wolf's way. He didn't let go. 

He didn't get bitten either, one second and then three and then five, and Zangetsu stood down, hackles smoothing down, told them _all is well_. Shiro was still quivering in his arms, his mind a wounded tangle of confusion and resentment for being left out, ignored by the old man and Ichigo, of alarm at his own body. What had they been _doing_ , _why_ , and why was he...?

Ichigo wasn't going to bother trying to explain biology to a wolf. They were smart as hell but that would still be Chinese to them. He wasn't even sure whether male wolves understood that sex led to cubs and they didn't just somehow happen -- that was kind of a long lag to track cause and effect.

 _Shhh-calm-love_ , he poured out, fingers digging into the white ruff. _All is normal-expected-fine-nice_. Shiro didn't allow himself to be petted hardly ever, but he didn't struggle now, still staring at the two strangers over Ichigo's shoulder, or whatever he could see of them with his shitty albino eyeballs.

"Well, she's not bleeding from the cunt," the man said with growling displeasure; it took Ichigo a second to remember the word. Right. Keigo's much-pored over Very Rude, Do Not Ever Use list. When Ichigo craned his neck he found the man standing by his wolf's shoulder, one hand on her bristling shoulders, his eyes cold and jaw tight. He still had a single boot on, pants dragging, caught on it. It should have looked ridiculous.

It didn't. He looked deadly, unashamed and proud, and still considering whether to be deadly to them.

"I'm glad she's not injured," Ichigo said quietly, and didn't stand, didn't let go. Didn't apologize, not just yet when the man wasn't ready to accept it.

The black wolf looked so still. Ichigo knew she could be on them in a second if the man's control slipped even a fraction of an inch. They'd be sitting ducks. 

"What the _fuck_ is his damage?"

Ichigo didn't sigh, just kept scratching gently along Shiro's spine. "If I knew I could fix it better. He's not a wild-born wolf but no official Japanese pack knows him. He thinks everybody wants to kill him, so he should kill them first. He... didn't want to kill your girl, I think," he added, even quieter. "He just doesn't understand what's going on, and it makes him angry."

The man hissed between his teeth, spat on the grass to the side. "Well that's too bad for him, because like hell if she'll let him on her back now."

"... That's fair." He didn't know if Shiro would _want_ to, he was so freaked out still.

Zangetsu heaved a sigh, walked closer slowly to sniff at Shiro's nose. For once Shiro barely curled his lip; the old man used his fangs oddly gently to catch the top of his nose, gnaw almost like reassurance, before he caught a more solid, commanding grip.

_No biting. Allies/peace. Like morning-sun-on-snow and baboon-and-snake._

_... I bite **them** too._

Ichigo sighed, arms slowly falling free to scratch around his shoulders, giving the underside of his neck a wide berth. "You know the difference, Shiro, give me a break." 

He hadn't tried to kill Zabimaru even half-seriously for months now, hadn't bitten Shirayuki for over a year. Mostly because he couldn't catch her, but he wasn't even trying to fuck her up mind-to-mind to slow her down like he did when it was for real.

"You can't attack -- what's her name?" he asked Zangetsu, and Zangetsu returned the exact same big cat in heavy greenery scent. Ichigo blinked. "No, not _his_ name--"

"It's the same," the man said in English, tone bored and annoyed about it. "Hers and mine. Spoken name's Pantera."

Ichigo blinked up at him, turning into his crouch to face him, one hand on each wolf to keep his balance.

Then he realized his dick was still hanging out -- and his zipper was trying to chew it off at the root. "--Ow, fuck!"

He stood, dancing in place as he tried to pour himself back into his pants and zip back up before they could fall down his legs. Then he dared a glance up, embarrassed to death. Good job, Ichigo, now the guy was going to want to entrust himself to him even _more_. Couldn't keep his murderous wolf in check even a little bit, and now on top of that like a cherry of lameness here he was with the smooth moves...

Sighing, the guy shook his head, slanting him a heavy-lidded, judging look, lips pinched. Ichigo hunched his shoulders defensively.

"He gonna do it again?" Pantera's human asked, bending down casually to put his free leg back into his pants. The white of them was thoroughly ruined with mossy streaks and darker mud stains, damply sticking to his skin; he didn't seem to care.

"I don't think so," Ichigo said absently, watching him move. He still had a hard time believing he'd been allowed to touch that body -- those rolling muscles, those battle scars. He had a harder time imagining he was gonna get to touch it again without serious crawling. 

Shiro growled quietly, nipped at Ichigo's hip, half-hearted about it. (He was still going to bruise, mind, but it didn't bleed even a little.)

"...Yeah, probably not."

"Alright." Grimmjow leaned down to pick up his other boot, pulled it on, didn't bother lacing it back up. "Time to move on."

Ichigo hesitated, watching him and Pantera turn their backs so decisively. Feeling... Oh.

"I didn't mean _without you guys_ , dipshit. Hurry up."

Ichigo caught up at a flustered jog, Zangetsu trotting calmly up ahead until he had caught up to Pantera's flank and staying there, leaving her a polite ten inches of space. Shiro was slunking along through the bushes, head low and tail tucked in. Ichigo felt a pinch of worry.

"You could have meant that. It would be fair."

"She still needs you." 

Ichigo winced. "... Sorry."

He got a surprise cuff to the back of his head for response.

"Oi!" He punched back at the nearest elbow by reflex, glowering -- and then he was dodging an arm trying to catch his neck, and then getting shoved/tripped into a tree, and _then_ caught in a headlock anyway. Augh.

"Don't fucking apologize again. _Own_ that shit. Your wolf's a freak. So? You know what happened Pantera's first heat?"

Half-choked by the guy's biceps, Ichigo tried to roll his eyes up enough to see his face, and got nowhere but Eyestrain City. He rolled his eyes again, but this time more for emphasis.

"She killed two of them." 

Ichigo paused before he could attempt to trip the guy.

_Didn't know what was going on either. (Teeth in her neck trying to make her submit she would **never** submit/mockery such a small baby wolf just stand here and take it you whore we're bigger older better there's no choice for you--)_

Ichigo inhaled sharply through his nose, a cold shock going down his spine. He didn't know if the man had meant to share so deep -- it didn't seem like him, but. 

It wasn't the dog-wolves who had thought she was a whore. Wolves didn't think like that. And her human was included in the _brats who should stand there and take it_.

Underneath the bare acceptance and the stark refusal to regret there was a hair-thin, running thread of... 

_(...she was nervous but she wanted it she wasn't the one who knew the toothy leers/who knew enough to get scared...)_

"You didn't make her kill them," Ichigo said bluntly. The arm around his neck tightened by reflex, sudden tension in the pack sense like a warning growl, shoving his mind away. He stepped on the guy's Achilles' tendon hard through the boot, elbowed himself a way free, glared to meet the incensed glare in kind. "You didn't make her!" he snapped before he could be told to butt out, that he knew jack shit, that he should shut up. "You think she would not figure out those assholes were -- were _assholes_ the second they started making it hurt?"

"I can take some fucking _hurt_!" the guy snarled back, getting in his face. "Fuck do you think I am?!"

"The guy getting said-- told in your mind how much fun it is, hurting you like you were a, a thing! A _toy_ , a _**nothing**_." He pulled in a heaving breath. "I'm not saying the _pain_ would be the _problem_. It'd be the... The _contempt_."

He was being stared at with wild animal eyes, nostrils flaring with rage and fangs at the ready. He made himself breathe out.

"It's sad for the wolves. They didn't ask for it, their brothers taught them shit thoughts and they trusted it, of course they did. But if anyone had treated me like that I would have wanted to hurt them too. And if anyone had made their wolf treat my wolves like that I would have hurt them for real."

One of the men _had_ died later, Ichigo suddenly knew. Rage-grief escalating into harassment despite all official orders to back off and _jaguar stalking through the rainforest_ had decided they were going to sort it out before the guy talked himself into beating them to death.

A back alley, a knife. The end. 

The other one had known better. She had a new wolf now. She found excuses to be elsewhere whenever their heat rolled around.

Ichigo's gorge rose; he swallowed desperately around the sudden shock. It hadn't been his first kill, either. One of the first, but not the first. Ichigo's daily violence had never gone farther than punches and kicks against other punks under the bridge; one time someone had slammed a plank on his arm and broken his elbow. He'd given concussions, broken bones. He'd never. He'd... Never.

He'd always managed to pull Shiro back before he could. At least with him, Shiro had never killed. Ichigo wasn't naive enough to think his wolf hadn't killed before they'd met. 

It wasn't like Ichigo was a total stranger to the question of violence, of _causing_ death, of associating with people who did. But there was being acquainted with the ethical dilemma as a possibility and there was killing a wannabe rapist at sixteen. And then killing more.

He had known they'd killed wolves. Military, no doubt. They had to have killed their humans too. Other soldiers. Enemies. Just a part of the job. It was a world Ichigo couldn't understand, that scared and revulsed him.

In front of him the man sneered, watching his paling face, feeling all his echoes. Cosseted little civilian. Grand untested ideals, turned to bile and shaking hands the second they clashed with even a glimpse of reality. Weak.

Ichigo caught two fistfuls of his collar and pulled him in; pulled himself up. Pressed a harsh, close-mouthed kiss on his mouth. His split lip stung.

_You entrusted yourself to me for this. I'm not letting you down._

The man had a hand closed around his wrist; he didn't tear Ichigo's hand off. Just stared into his eyes like he could see his soul. Around them the wolves had stopped, were staring too, all three. None of them even growled. 

A slow feeling of measured acceptance seeped through the pack bond. The guy nodded, just barely. 

_I did, didn't I._

"I'll take you at your word. For now."

 _You're kind of interesting_ , he sent, lip curling in a slow smile, and he started walking again. (Ichigo dropped his hands hurriedly, stuffed them in his pockets to control the need to grab onto him again -- hold his elbow or his wrist or his _hand_. Some kind of contact.) _Like a puppy playing the king of a dung heap._

"--Oi!"

"Heh. Anyway, I lied, Pantera and my scent names are different, actually." He gave Ichigo and his wolves both of them. Ichigo could pick out just about zero difference, and Shiro couldn't either. No idea what Zangetsu got out of it. "Only her jaguar's a black one, and mine's a normal blond."

"...How is that a _scent_ difference?"

"Dude, you've never smelled a redhead? Wait, what am I saying, you can't smell yourself. Take it on trust, there _is_ a redhead stank." Ichigo kicked at him. The guy dodged without even appearing to look at him. "Like, biologically. There's totally a chemical _thing_."

"At this point you're just comparing different people scents, who knows if it's the hair color you can smell--"

"--We're entirely capable of taking in _many_ scents and drawing fucking logical conclusions on statistics such as _redheads have a smell_ and _so do blonds_ , you guys just stink worse so even humans can tell--"

"--How you can talk about other people's smells when the dye in your hair is killing small animals at ten meters I will _never know_."

A pause.

"Shit, that's right, you dyed your downstairs too. Well, my greatest apologies for my failure, lord cat, but no blowjobs for you. I would die."

The man actually grabbed his crotch, leering. "Hell yes you would, and not from my pubes."

Willfully ignoring the clear shape of his semi through the cloth, Ichigo rolled his eyes and elbowed him, was elbowed back. Bickering, they went on through the woods, shoving and slapping in lieu of all the nicer touching that Ichigo knew he couldn't yet get away with.

But maybe at some point. Maybe Grimmjow would let Ichigo take care of him.


	4. Chapter 4

"Ugh, I actually want to keep you, what the fuck." 

Grimmjow had just gotten his third serious dicking of the night. Face down in his sleeping bag, he mumbled into his crossed arms. Pantera and the black one were done with this round and so was he, waiting out the tie, but his stud wasn't and still rocked slow into him. His hands pressed firm and warm against the small of Grimmjow's back, fanned out to span the whole width of it; they kept him down with his back arched, presenting his ass. He could have purred.

"That wasn't English," the guy pointed out, amused. He'd been doing that every time Grimmjow slipped up.

"No shit, bitch." He knew it was the heat making him love the hard length inside him so much and once it was done he wouldn't feel the same. That didn't stop him vaguely considering carrying his civilian hookup all the way back to base, sneaking him into his barracks like contraband moonshine so he could spar him sharper by day and ride that dick by night. Righteous little prick, and so naive it made Grimmjow want to puke, but he did have the reflexes and the strength of will to become dangerous...

 _Could be pack_ , Pantera agreed sleepily.

Of course he had also decided Grimmjow and Pantera needed protected of all fucking things and it'd be maybe ten minutes before he got himself into a fight with Yammy or God forbid Nnoitra and Grimmjow's hot ride ended up mincemeat.

 _Or_ , the tuxedo wolf floated him, light like he had no idea he hadn't been supposed to hear _these_ thoughts, _Ichigo, Shiro and I are a strong team and will beat them._

There actually was a wolf who referred to people with things that came through as sounds and words instead of scents and notions. It was fucking creepy in Grimmjow's opinion. He hadn't even fully remembered the kid's name, it wasn't like he was the one supplying the missing info there. _You telling him about this?_

Ichigo kept moving like a boat on a gentle sea, slow rolls and all patience, like he could have kept it up another hour. 

It was different from what Pantera felt. Before they came it might have bothered him for real. It mostly made it more shivery, more unexpected.

 _No_ , Tuxedo said after a moment's thought. _Ichigo must learn to listen on his own. Shiro speaks so loudly, he hasn't learned to properly reach back._

 _... Well, good._ He cracked an eye open to give the wolf a side-look. _Better stay that way._ Having a nosy busybody in his business was bad enough, the last thing Grimmjow needed was for him to be a gossip as well. Or for his bondmate to decide to nose around too.

Grimmjow had already overshared a couple of times, and how _that_ had happened he was starting to think to blame the guy and his weirdassed wolves, because sure as hell Grimmjow being horny didn't usually mean he slipped up with op-sec and his own private shit. He'd have to kill every Espada just to avoid dealing with the embarrassment if his mind could be so loose out of outright torture.

"You planning to nut any time soon?"

"Ah... No. I'm waiting on next time."

"... Why."

"Broken dick doesn't sound good."

Snorting, Grimmjow shifted his weight; his knees ached, sleeping bag or not. 

He knew he should be asking the guy more about his wolves -- discreet-like, just shooting the shit. He couldn't help but snort again. Sergeant Jaegerjaquez setting up a honey trap, using his wiles to extract intel. It was ridiculous.

If he didn't know then Aizen couldn't get it out of him. He already knew too much -- he knew that Shiro's mind didn't even feel like a basic Arrancar's, one of the teeming masses of almost-good-enough; it felt like an Espada's. As mad as Szayel's Fornicaras, as heavy as Barragan's Ira. He wasn't even _trained_.

... Where _was_ Shiro? 

"Think we lost your crazy. He off sulking?"

Ichigo shrugged. "I don't know. Hunting. I gave up on stopping him murdering wild animals. I don't have the strength for that _and_ the pet animals."

Grimmjow snorted. "Yeah, I never did bother."

Tuxedo and Pantera slipped free of each other; with a sigh Grimmjow pushed off the guy's dick, let himself flop forward inelegantly on the sleeping bag, and stretched out on his side. He'd shelled out for a nice thick fluffy one and while it made bracing while getting his ass hammered a slippery proposition it was so worth it during the in-between times. So much comfier than their standard equipment, jesus, he might try to sneak it in his backpack next time he was in the field...

Ichigo was still standing on his knees behind him with his hard-on waving in the night breeze, less looking than _feeling_ amused and dismayed in equal measures. Grimmjow arched an eyebrow, prodded back with an eye-rolling _what's got you in a knot **now**_.

"It's nothing. Um. Can I sit."

Grimmjow smirked, head resting heavy on his arm. "Sure, _buddy_ , the forest floor is free."

"Asshole," Ichigo said in his lilting accent as he tucked himself back in, and sat on the edge of the sleeping bag anyway, knees up and back ramrod straight.

"You'll fuck me on it but you barely sit without an invitation. Pfft."

"You're the delicate neko with his sensitive feelings," Ichigo replied with wide-eyed innocence, "I don't want to intrude on your safe space." 

Grimmjow planted his foot on his hip and shoved him on the grass.

It was... kind of an odd feeling, not being taken seriously. Not that Ichigo didn't respect him, but. The guy knew he and Pantera murdered people for a living and still went and teased him like they were school chums instead. 

He wasn't sure if he wanted to rectify that or let it slide. Kid was freely helping him out of a really annoying situation after all. And they'd probably never see each other again once Pantera's heat was done. Maybe he could live with _one_ outsider knowing he existed and not being secretly terrified he was gonna show up one night and stab them in the throat to ensure their silence. 

"--Wait, the fuck did you call me."

 _Blackberries in a thicket_ rolled his lips inwards, pointedly pinching them. "Neko...? I don't know the English slang for it. It's for the one who takes."

Grimmjow pushed himself up on one hand, slow and menacing. "No, it means fucking _kitty_."

"No, that'd be neko-chan, or even nyan-chan," the little jerk corrected without thought, and then blinked. "Holy shit, you're neko twice."

Grimmjow lunged, hand flying for his neck. The boy pushed back by reflex, rolled in the grass, already laughing.

"I'm a fucking _jaguar_ , asshole, have some respect," Grimmjow growled with zero seriousness. Ichigo grinned back at him, sprawled back halfway under a bush.

"And I'm a blackberry, not a strawberry, so fuck you, kitty."

Grimmjow glowered at him, reluctant to leave the sleeping bag. His ass ached and his knees and hips were sore; he didn't want to bother with even a pretend-chase. "Har har. Eat his face, Pantera, will ya?"

She was curled in a black ball against the cliff; Tuxedo had curled up two feet away, mirroring her without touching. She grumbled back, _No. **Nap**. Yapping puppies will be bitten_, she added, damn well including both humans. Traitress.

He laid back down, resting his cheek on his biceps, arm curled over his head to comb absently at tangled, sweat-damp hair. After a couple of minutes Ichigo came back to sit by his feet. Grimmjow contemplated kicking him, on principle, but Pantera's tiredness dragged him down; he didn't want to move. He wanted to move so little he couldn't bring himself to reach behind him for the other end of the sleeping bag and roll it over his naked skin, and the air was getting unpleasantly cold with how sweaty he'd gotten earlier.

Ichigo meanwhile looked as unaffected as if they'd taken a casual stroll through the woods instead. Maybe a mild, couple-hours hike. Instead of getting dragged into a heat frenzy-induced hard fuck _three fucking times_.

... Well, whatever. Disgruntled, Grimmjow closed his eyes for a short nap, trying not to dwell on how well the annoying twerp was handling it. Who the hell wasn't a complete frazzled mess during their first heat anyway? _Ugh_.

And now he was _pulling the edge of the sleeping bag over Grimmjow_. 

Yeah, no way was Grimmjow kidnapping him a second time. He'd end up murdering him before Nnoitra could even lift a knife. He cracked an eye open to glare and snatched up the corner of the sleeping bag to pull it closer around himself before that utter and complete asshole tried to tuck him in.

"Heh."

"Smug really ain't as attractive a look as you think it is."

 _So how do you explain how hot you are then_ shot through between them, then _oh fuck embarrassing/did I make your ego worse oh no shit_. Grimmjow blinked, and then started cackling as Ichigo groaned.

He would have teased him more, but then he yawned, irrepressible. Fine, he could take a hint. He waved his hand vaguely over his head, still throwing out amused mockery, and settled back onto his folded arm. Let the guy keep watch if he wanted to waste energy on admiring Grimmjow's beautiful face and protecting him from the trees or whatever.

"Oh, fuck you," _blackberries (discreet sweet-and-sour notes hidden amongst hard leaves and thorns)_ muttered, but quietly enough that it didn't stop him falling asleep.

He got to doze maybe five fucking minutes before some asshole in white furs interrupted.

\--

Whenever Shiro called his name, he always put more emphasis on the thorns. Less the weak, dry scent and more the notion of them, the image-feel.

Ichigo thought Shiro liked it, or at least that was one part of Ichigo he approved of; the part that could hurt. Still, most of the time he kept to the wolf equivalent of 'hey you', when it wasn't 'hey, asshole'.

_(small tasty sweet-sour bits in fur-tearing tangles) situation/what are things like over here/check-in?_

There was an odd undertone in his request. Like Shiro actually cared about the mood for once.

Blinking slowly, Ichigo took the time to scan his surroundings, raise his awareness of it. Pantera and the old man sleeping curled-up-no-touching, Grimmjow napping under a corner of the sleeping bag, sweaty-tired scents, calm quiet night breeze. Safe, restful. _Why? You gonna pounce Pantera again?_

_... Shut up._

Then he did barge into the clearing like he was going to pounce Pantera again. Ichigo moved to stand, wary -- 

Pantera was up already, gone from a sleepy curl to battle-ready in a single second. Grimmjow rolled onto hands and feet, ready to tackle or pounce; his mind radiated grumpy-sleepy-murderous.

Shiro slowed down on approach, head low, something dark in his --

"What the _hell_ are you holding?" 

Dark and wriggling -- live prey, and then he dropped it in the middle of the grassy space between the cliff and the woods and Ichigo's eyes exploded into blinding light. Something roaring -- _a car charging at him what the_ \--

" _Tanuki!_ " Ichigo called out to Grimmjow and Pantera, forcing _small-tricky-beast- **fake!**_ through their utter, alarmed bafflement.

A spark of understanding -- a lightning-quick _dog/wolf cousin??_ check-in with Ichigo -- and then _delight_.

The car was still charging at them, blinding them utterly. (They were in the _woods_ , what the hell.) Squinting, Ichigo couldn't even see Pantera through his own eyes -- but the old man knew when she charged, pouncing for a never-smelled-before scurrying scent along the cliff.

She herded it straight across Zangetsu's patiently weary back, bouncing blind after it, then got ahead of it somehow, herded it back over him and -- "Ack, Grimmjow!"

 _(Predatory amusement)_ was all the reply Ichigo got. Blinking white spots out of his eyes, Ichigo watched the man's hand shoot out to snatch at the animal -- grabbing one leg in passing and then letting go as it flipped over to bite itself free --

Then Pantera chased it right into the little lean-to shelter, cornering it good and proper. The headlights illusion dissipated -- suddenly there were giant, moose-sized wolves charging at them, slobbering with rabid hunger. Ichigo could feel Shiro snap his fangs at them on reflex, but almost casually.

A yelp, and then Ichigo had to dodge low as Pantera lobbed the tanuki right through where he was standing and followed in an eager leap. 

It didn't last very long after that, though the illusions got more disturbing, incoherent with fear and pain before the final crunch. Wincing, Ichigo slumped back on the grass, then shivered. It was... It wasn't _cold_ exactly, but.

His guts were in a knot with nerves. He didn't... 

"Sorry about that," he said to Grimmjow when he could see him again, knowing he was babbling a little. It always made him feel bad when Shiro went after one of those. It wasn't like they were endangered, but, well, they were cute. His sisters liked them. Poor things. "That was a raccoon-dog. They can get into the senses but they don't give their feelings and thoughts, not like a wolf."

Sitting with his knees casually spread and his wrists resting loose and relaxed on them, Grimmjow watched his wolf noisily take the tanuki apart.

"Yeah, maned wolves can do some weird shit too."

Ichigo ran his hands over his thighs a couple times. His mouth was dry. "Maned wolves?"

"Big-ass foxes on weirdly long legs. They do this 'I'm not there' field. You can be staring one in the face and you'll still believe there's nothing there. Which is disturbing because they're fire-orange and almost wolf-sized. You realize Whitey's trying to bribe Pantera to let him hit it, yeah?"

Ichigo flushed. At the back of his head something small and nervous went, _is it working?_

Grimmjow snorted, gave him an unimpressed, heavy-lidded look. God he looked so distant when he looked at Ichigo like that, as if he was miles away and nothing Ichigo could do would _reach_.

It was _torture_. It was -- it wasn't fair, it was. He was _trying_ here, why wouldn't this asshole -- why?!

Ichigo was on his feet in a crouch in a second and springing; he tackled that smug, disdainful jerk right in the chest. Grimmjow rolled with him, accompanying the momentum, and Ichigo snarled his frustration even as he was pinned down with ridiculous ease, with -- he'd thrown himself straight ahead and telegraphed his move three centuries ago, what did he expect? He swiped his arms up to break Grimmjow's hold on his collar, threw his weight to the side to roll on top of him and it was, he discovered quickly, really hard to do a grappling hold using someone's clothes when that someone was naked. 

Grimmjow barked out a quick laugh at that thought, forced a thigh between his legs to shove at Ichigo's heels, sending them skidding on damp grass so that Ichigo couldn't brace and rear up in a reverse bridge. Pinned _again_ \-- he was going to scream, how the fuck was he so good, Ichigo had held his own earlier and now he just -- it didn't _work!_

"You're grappling on the ground with someone who's got over thirty pounds on you, dumbass--"

Ichigo bit him.

Struggling against the hold on his wrists, he reared off the ground, teeth latched onto the man's shoulder, just an inch off his neck. Hissing between his teeth, Grimmjow tried to slam him back down but Ichigo's shoulders took the twist and the strain with barely a twinge. Briefly releasing his prey, he bit again -- the side of his neck, teeth raking against skin. He failed to catch a grip this time around but the man rolled back to avoid him and it was just enough distance to shove them into another roll, to -- 

Belly to belly and he was so hard, he needed so much, he -- it wasn't right, face to face like this but he barely cared, he _just fucking needed_ \-- he knocked _Jaguar stalking through the rainforest_ 's hands off his and grabbed at his hips, his thighs, leaving accidental scratch marks and bruises trying to shove a way open.

" _Holy f--_ " Torrent of strange swearing in his ears, meaningless, hissed between clenched teeth. He didn't care about fucking mouth noises, he didn't care to decipher and translate and beg for pointless shards of meaning, he knew the deeper meaning and the meaning was _Ichigo needed to be fucking him already_.

God. So clumsy, hands and the whole of his body -- clothes, why did he still have those, caught in cloth and zippers and bullshit -- his hands were shaking. He -- his hands were shaking. He paused to stare at them, bewildered. Did -- was he -- what? 

Clear eyes so close to his, staring right back. Foreign shape and foreign color and utterly unflinching, intense with things he couldn't name, couldn't think through, couldn't --

"What do you _want_ , Ichigo?"

More mouth noises and _that wasn't his name_ and he. He understood anyway. What did he want? He knew with his body but he couldn't think it through, he. It was too much. He wanted to bite and tear and force this body before him to take what he wanted to give, that could give him what he needed but what _was_ that? Fuck. _Fuck_.

Lips curled in a faint, close-mouthed smirk. He stared at them, wanted to -- bite, lick at them. He leaned down, didn't know if. Didn't know. He nipped at his jaw instead, his chin, making a soft confused noise of need.

 _Jaguar stalking through the rainforest_ nipped back at his lower lip, did something wet and hot. He melted in relief into that mouth, sloppy and too hot all over. Yes. More. Yes.

A hand closed on the back of his neck, tugging him back to create cold space between them. He didn't like that. He growled, bit down on _Jaguar stalking through the rainforest_ 'slip in punishment -- the other male (the warm body under him) twisted around, taking his mouth away, how _dare_ he. But _blackberries in a thicket_ 's neck was free now and he poured himself right back on top of him to pin him down, closed his teeth on the back of his neck, he raked his front limbs and their dull claws down his (her) flank and then, oh, _right_. Oh. 

How could he forget, he wondered distantly, hips rolling with feverish intensity, looking for the waiting hole, the wet warm-- (How come he hadn't known? No one had _told_ him, why--)

Inside. Long tight glide, unrelenting push until he was entirely, god, why wouldn't his tip catch, he was almost there (he was already in, needed to thrust but thrusting in the void would be hideous, would, no, he had to wait/he had to search lower, he had to--)

Inside, again (first time.) He forgot the rest. 

Claws and teeth and holding on, desperate to press deeper inside this clenching heat, to give it everything it could take and then more. Desperate to -- mine, can't/won't stop, so much/I never knew why/oh, astonished need.

He was distantly aware he was making noises, high-pitched lost-puppy noises, harsh breaths and groans and so many more, made them with both throats and both mouths. Enemies might find them but _rain on slick glass and pavement_ was there and watching out for them and he knew -- couldn't trust -- _had_ to trust, had _always_ trusted -- they were safe because he was there and it was okay to let go. 

A tight hold on his (their) dick, the approaching echo of hard heat shoving at their insides in that invasive-carnal-inescapable-fantastic way, bodies rocking from hard thrusts in the cold night air -- grass tickling at their flanks, their bare chest, the copper taste of tanuki blood still in their teeth. Holding onto and being held onto.

Tearing edges of mind catching a grip in each other instead. Synchronicity. A single mind in four bodies, all rushing toward the same--

A two-tone howl rang through the woods. _Blackberries in a thorn bush/meat and entrails and live-dying prey_ 's throat hurt. Maybe just _blackberries_. Waves of warmth and, and light -- like a good sneeze and a hot rock to nap on in the sun and Karin's careful hands, only, only. _Huge_. Buzzing.

He was trembling. They? Maybe they. So good, too much but he didn't want it to go away, not yet, and it was. Whimper. So much.

Soft tongue on his chin, licking fur back. Soft -- paw. Hand? On his hand. Yes. He was here. 

They were here? 

And also there. Yes.

They reached toward _rain on slick glass and pavement_ with trembling awe, with fear. He touched them with cool shielding thoughts, smoothed down raised hackles and curled-back lips. All was good. All was very good. They'd done good. He was proud of them.

They... He, the one who had a short face and skin nuzzled into damp sweaty skin, remembered to breathe in patterns; the one with the long nose and proper shielding fur followed. Slow and deep breaths. All was good. 

... Holy shit. 

Ichigo pressed his face into Grimmjow's neck and Shiro followed, awkwardly nuzzling, not quite knowing what he was looking for but _blackberries in a thicket_ found it calming-safe, thought it was proper/thank-you. Their partners/lovers/mates should have that; cautious breaths against tender places, soft shaking kisses. 

They'd... Holy shit. 

He'd fucked Grimmjow flat against the ground, hammered him down from hands and knees, and he hadn't even noticed. He had left bites, bleeding scratches -- Shiro could smell them from here, _Zangetsu_ could smell them. He still remembered his hands trying to force Grimmjow's thighs open, furiously unconcerned with what Grimmjow himself might want.

"Are you okay," he asked. His voice shook a little. He couldn't imagine that the man would say yes. Ichigo had fucked him like he was trying to destroy him instead, to plow a way right through and out the other side of him. His hands flitted around as he tried to find someplace to brace, to take his weight off him.

"You pull out now and I'm cutting your dick off to make a dildo," Grimmjow said with careless unconcern. His voice was rough, scratched up and low. Something hot and possessive shivered through Ichigo's guts.

"I... No pulling out. Okay. Are you -- good? Where does it. I'm--"

Shiro still felt good, his knot caught right and proper inside Pantera, but it was calmer now, more sustainable, and he could find enough brainpower to wonder what the fuck. 

"Ah, _god_ , that was good." Grimmjow stretched his arms before him, rounded his back into Ichigo's chest, eyes closed. "Best fuck I've had in years."

"I _pinned you down and made you bleed_ ," Ichigo said sternly, voice tight and choked.

Grimmjow cracked an eye open to look at him over his shoulder -- then snorted, mouth pinched down, then laughed, body gone loose in the damp grass and shaking with his amusement.

His mind caught onto Ichigo's -- all serrated edges and hard, shining surfaces, like Shiro's, like Pantera's, and he pulled.

His body from the inside felt heavy and pulsing with blood flow, warm and chafed with repeated impacts and it felt so good, so vital and strong, so anchoring. It was starting to chafe and sting around Ichigo's dick (oh god was he really that big, was this how it felt to have something, _someone_ inside you?) but he didn't want to stop until ever dreg and echo of pleasure was cold, extinguished. The memory of that four-parts orgasm still shivered through every inch of him; his body was a quietening concerto for a strange harmony of sensations. Human-warmth and a good solid weight on him, cool breeze, and sweat, and splatters of lube and dripping come.

"If you think I didn't _want_ you to stop being so polite and fuck me like you meant it..."

Blushing, Ichigo ducked his head. He didn't know where to put his weight. Cautiously, he settled back down on Grimmjow's wide back, cheek resting -- after serious deliberations -- against his shoulder blade.

"You're not... _bad_ hurt."

Grimmjow grunted, mouth closed. _No_.

"You liked it."

_Loved it. Went up like a pent-up little virgin. (Dammed-up river, C4, explosion. Mud and water tearing everything out on their way. Riverbed never the same again.)_

_Riverbed being your ass_? Ichigo thought back instantly, and then slapped a hand across his silent mouth. _Augh thinking too fast sorry. (reluctant amusement/embarrassed/sorry)_

Grimmjow was mostly amused. Sure it was crass but that was nothing if not familiar. "What, you want to have changed the geography down there? Gonna have to try harder. Plant a couple trees maybe."

He wriggled his hips a little. Ichigo's half-hard dick rippled in too-bright pleasure at the reminder.

"That's where you say you've got some trunks for me."

"Uuuugh. I don't want to talk ever again." Ichigo nuzzled blindly at sweaty skin, stole a fast, guilty kiss. He could feel Grimmjow twitch under him; the man didn't say anything, though. "... I'm so tired."

" _Hah_."

He sounded vindicated, of all things. Ichigo blinked, bemused, lips curling up despite himself. Behind them Shiro hadn't figured out how to dismount, but he didn't really want to either; Pantera stood with uncharacteristic patience under his weight and accepted Zangetsu's nose licks and offered bits and piece of tanuki like a queen accepts her due tribute.

Shiro was gonna remember he hated touching people and wolves very soon, but for now he was still in his afterglow, still tied snug and warm, and he felt safe. He would hate being mounted, Ichigo could feel him thinking, having teeth at the back of his neck -- he would fight even Zangetsu over that one, even if he wouldn't fight him to kill. He didn't really understand how Pantera could be alright with it.

Ichigo turned his head to watch as Shiro chewed thoughtfully at her short ruff; first a testing nip and then a more comfortable full-out gnawing motion. 

Pantera snorted, twisted her neck around to catch his muzzle in her maw, hold it for a few seconds' warning, then let go. Shiro growled quietly and went right back to sneaking in nibbles. It was... It was _fucking adorable_. Ichigo wondered if he'd gone crazy; he laughed a little, incredulous. 

"That's practically a love letter," Grimmjow said, amused. 

"The nibbling? Oh god, yes."

"That and he basically said Tux could hit that and _not_ die."

Ichigo flushed. Okay, gay wolves. Gay wolves _were_ a thing, he supposed. Like, naturally. One he had never thought about and he really didn't want to know if his own bondmates started going at it. It was weird to think about because they were both legally Ichigo's _brothers,_ but it wasn't like they were related for real. 

Would he feel it like he was feeling this heat, or like. What. Masturbation? God, he would get it coming and going --

 _If I did mount him he would not remember what killing even is_ , Zangetsu shared with tranquil smugness. Ichigo straight-up died. Then Grimmjow started laughing so hard he bucked him right off; rolling down his side, Ichigo let himself slump in the grass, semi flopping around sadly, and whimpering, an arm thrown across his eyes.

" _No_ ," he begged the uncaring skies as Grimmjow cackled beside him. "Old man, you're fucking _forbidden_ from debauching Shiro. He's an _innocent child_ and it's already weird that I know what my own penis feels like from this jerk, I really don't wanna know about _yours_. Without another human in the mix to distract me I'm gonna get way too many details, okay? No."

"Play your cards right and you can find out what mine feels like," Grimmjow purred, suddenly leaning over him to whisper in his ear. Ichigo shrieked a little.

He glared up. The man looking down at him from a few inches off was still unfairly gorgeous, teeth on display in that smug lopsided smirk, hair a tousled, artistic mess; even the smear of mud on his cheekbone only highlighted it. 

"Okay, _no_ ," Ichigo retorted, determined not to let himself lose, be it in a physical fight or a words one, " _first things first_ , unless you're planning to outfit your _lady wolf_ with a _wolf strap-on_ \--"

The two of them started wrestling, still throwing insults and comebacks at each other. At no point did Ichigo give in and kiss him, but he wasn't sure how.

(Grimmjow hadn't meant it, right? Topping him. He couldn't, during a heat, and outside of it... Well, outside of it he would leave. But Ichigo's body was wide-awake and eager, burning with curiosity, and all the nerves and wariness in the world couldn't stop him wondering how that would feel.)


End file.
